In my columns I have written about traditions, nations, different sides of human beings, the roles people play in society, cultural differences, human nature, yet what every living person has in common, regardless of location, sex, age, race, religion is… we all dream, we all make wishes, and wishes have the same impact, meaning and importance to the entire human race.

In the course of our lives we may convert to a different religion, we may move, we may go abroad (for a variety of purposes), we may get plastic surgery, we may even change our gender, but as we do we make wishes. Our lives become filled with different wishes. I don’t mean needs, but wishes, dreams that take us to other dimensions (if I may say this), and at some point it’s dreams that drive us towards the future we wish to have.

Have you ever wanted something so badly it squeezes your entire body and mind? It even deforms your life and becomes your dream. It takes us to a world where we fulfill it, and as we experience living our dreams in our imagination we smile. This smile gives us peace of mind, because the dream is stronger than us. It consumes our minds and we search for ways to make it real. It shrinks us, it’s like a hunger we cannot satisfy, we become restless, yet it doesn’t make us blue but gives us strength, makes our brain work through different opportunities. We know for sure that we won’t relax until we find a way to get there. We chase it: we go to the places and meet the people that make us feel closer to our dream.

At an early age, when we don’t quite know when our birthday is, when we believe in Santa Claus, we make wishes. We wait for Santa to make them real, or our parents. But when we grow up we actually get to strive for our dreams, we invest money and time and all our thinking in achieving them.

As I have said before I have pictures on my wall of all the significant moments that have happened, or which I want to happen, in my life. Back in the day when I believed in Santa Claus, when I didn’t know a word of English, when I didn’t even know where America was (I only knew it was somewhere far away), I knew I wanted to go there. And I did. I always wanted to do a parachute jump. And I did. Jumping off the plane at Lompoc Airport (Ca. USA) I viewed the sunset and Hawaii while freefalling. I have been blessed with making quite a few of my dreams come true. There are several that are waiting for their shot and I’m looking forward to it.

There is a saying that “the dream is significant until it comes true” but I don’t agree. It’s the sweetest feeling you can possibly get as a human being. Every time your wish loses its significance by coming true you think of all the days when you didn’t know how to get there, when you smiled waking up hoping all the brainwork you had done finding a way would help you. You remember all the moments it randomly occurred to you when you were somewhere completely unconnected and took your breath away. It fogs your mind and directs your existence to a certain place, an oasis of our imaginary life containing us and our fulfilled dreams. No matter how busy or harsh our day is, as soon as we think of our dream we smile and catch our second wind, because we have something beautiful to live for.

Beside their theoretical meaning, dreams actually define our noble capacities. Life becomes a question of how far we are capable of going to chase our dreams. What opportunities are we willing to take in order to get what we want, even when we want it very badly? Are we just wishing, or do we get obsessed by our wishes? This is where we have to (well, we don’t have to, but hopefully we do) find a fine line between obsessing and wishing, a line between decency and dishonour. Yet, I am not the one to judge if we do or don’t ever find that line. I have experienced wishing something so badly I could hear my heartbeat and feel my skin swell while my mind was occupied with other things. And this can happen to anyone regardless of who they are and what they do. We all resemble each other when we want something.

Thanks to technical and medical achievements so many things have became doable, yet expensive, in the twenty-first century. Why don’t we stop buying weapons and drugs and save that money? Instead of buying a ‘ticket’ into a few hours of nirvana or buying other people a forcible ticket to the next world by shooting them, why not buy a more expensive ticket to the moon and enjoy infinite hours in space, buy a fancy bunch of flowers and give them to your loved ones (trust me, every woman wants one) or buy a trip and see all the wonders which humanity and nature have given us?

I could go on forever listing suggestions that are better investments than drugs and weapons, but I am not to proclaim what people should do with their lives, time and money. Yet I know for sure that if Georgians won’t set their bodies free, they can at least set their minds free and simply dream, make wishes. Georgian people were so repressed for decades that they never learned to dream big. The older generations were raised without even room for dreams, but we have it, so why don’t we use it?

The older generation lived by the rules that Communism made for them. Life was not about dreaming, but the very narrow opportunities the Government could give them. At one glance they had organised lives and everything seemed to work, but the order of things was set by the regime, not the people. When, if not now, should ordinary people who live in this ancient country let their minds free and make wishes, even knowing that Santa Claus doesn’t exist?

We are used to thinking that we can’t even afford to wish, let alone make those wishes real. But we can. We may even become happy dreamers as opposed to tired, hungry constant worriers, and the happier we are the better the world is going to be. And we are going to be the part of that world, and its creators.

Are you a happy dreamer?! I am, and my dreams come true. May yours too!